Quite a while ago, James blogged about the great radio in Boston. Alas, living in Northern Virginia doesn't offer the same selection. Sure, there are three different "All the hits from the 80s 90s and now!" stations, but frankly, I can only take so much Matchbox 20.
So, I started downloading some Podcasts. It took a while to find some worth listening too, but I've settled on three that, while not the highest quality, they suit me pretty well:
Coverville is a thrice-weekly podcast of all cover songs. Some by bands I'll recognize, some I won't. Shoot, sometimes I don't recognize the bands being covered, either. But it's always entertaining. There are two things Brain Ibbet does with the show I like. First, I love the "Cover Story" shows, were he only plays covers of one particular band. Recent Cover Stories include "The Police and Elvis Costello. Second, every week he plays "The Uncovered Gem of the Week." Its the one song that isn't (usually) a cover, and usually isn't a band that I've ever heard of before. The only thing I really don't like about Coverville is the Sunday night show includes a trivia bit, called Musically Challenged. In this segment, Brian answers trivia questions that come from Voices from the Vault. Brian should either just play the trivia bit and let the listeners answer the questions, or cut the segment entirely. If I wanted to listen to people play trivia, I'd Tivo Jeopardy.
I've also been listening to Worst Music You've Ever Heard and Up The Tree. Both play great indie music, but both have way too much chatter. It;s mildly entertaining, but I usually just skip past it to get to the songs.
I have also subscribed to a handful of NPR feeds, but my commute to work is only about 20 minutes (that's by car or bike), So I don't even have time to listen to the three Podcasts I previously mentioned.
I've also been listening to some of the XM Radio stations provided by AOL Radio. AOL has a decent Mac radio client in beta (SNS sign-in required).
I have to agree with James, though: the problem with most podcasts, even my three favorite, is they sound like a kid sitting in his room with a tape recorder. They talk a little too much about the process and problems of making the podcast.
